How did you become a Sheffield Wednesday fan? PT.II

Hello! Welcome back, we haven't blogged for a very long time but we're back with a bang as I asked another one of our American members WHY ON EARTH do you follow the Wednesday?

As you may or may not know we have around 40+ members on the books of the New York Owls nowadays, our members live in the tri-state area, a lot in the city, some in New Jersey and some in Connecticut. Jeff is one of our American owls who lives in Connecticut, and despite it taking around an hour to get into the city for our games he's one of our regular attendees. Which is to be applauded when you take into account most of our TV games are at 7.15am.

Before I hand you over to Jeff, here's a quick plug for our meet up this Saturday, at the Football Factory, 7.15am against Forest. Its our first proper look at the team over here so come on down and watch it with the New York Owls.

So Jeff, how did you become a fan of the mighty blue and white wizards?

There’s a logical, maybe even heartwarming, story I could
tell here.

A young soccer player, a short midfielder with some pace,
dreams of one day playing for the US Men’s National Team. Of course he would idolize John Harkes and be
drawn to the English side that he made his name with. And because he was a
particularly stubborn (and had plenty of experience with crushing
disappointment as a New York Mets fan), he stuck with that team through thick
and (mostly) thin for the next 20 years.

But that’s not my story.

On his album Hilarious,
the comedian Louis C.K. has a bit about how his young children pick their
friends: “Our children chose each other, based on no criteria by the way.
They’re the same size. They don’t give a shit who they make me hang out with.”

That’s…uh, more like my story.

When I was a child, the regional cable channel that showed
Mets games would also show a First Division recap show on Saturday Mornings.
The TV was inevitably still on the channel from the night before, so before my
Saturday morning cartoons, I would watch the previous week’s highlights. And as
they would usually just show a bunch of goals, it was not John Harkes who first
caught my eye, but David Hirst, scoring worldies every week in tiny, tiny
shorts.

But even that wasn’t the real
reason I ended up a Wednesdayite. It comes down to this. I was ten years
old. I liked the color blue, and I liked owls. And I didn’t give
a shit who that would force me to hang out with over the next twenty years.

Sportschannel eventually became Fox Sports NY, and stopped
showing that First Division recap show. The internet was still running on 14.4k
dial-up modems, making following the team all but impossible, but if anyone
asked me, I was a Sheffield Wednesday fan. That part above about my being
stubborn and used to crushing disappointment is true at least. By the time I
could even regularly check the results again, I was in college and Wednesday
was languishing in the lower leagues.

It didn’t really matter though. At 12:15 sharp on Saturday
morning I would fire up the old Wednesday website and check the box, the modern
equivalent of my childhood recap show. I found another striker to love soon
after, Steve MacLean (all those penalties looked the same as any other goal in
the box score), and was devastated when they didn’t re-sign him. ESPN started
showing the odd Championship game on their old ESPN3 streams, and Wednesday
player let me listen to the rest. When the team was in danger of a winding up
and looked like they’d be stuck in the lower tiers forever I dabbled with
taking on a second team in the EPL (Villa, because of Agbonlahor and the fact
that I refuse to allow myself nice things), but it never felt right. I’d rather
watch a dodgy stream of Wednesday against Exeter with unintelligible Eastern
European commentary.

As an American Wednesday supporter, I am often preoccupied
with the idea of ‘authenticity.’ I didn’t grow up in Yorkshire, and just
because I chose Wednesday (rather than Arsenal like every other American), that
doesn’t grant me the same connection to the team. But from my first day at Football Factory
(Wednesday 3, Hull City 1), the New York Owls have always made me feel welcome.
And while I may have taken a slightly unusual path to get here, I will proudly
descend the Football Factory steps at 7 AM this Saturday belting out “Hi Ho
Sheffield Wednesday.” There are some benefits to being stubborn.